Mr. SPECTER. Mr. President, our Nation lost a valuable member of its national security team recently, when Richard E. Curl died at the age of 77. Dick Curl was Director of the Office of Intelligence Resources in the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research. He was not the former Director, not the retiring Director, but very much the active Director of that office, even at the age of 77.

Dick Curl devoted his life to intelligence. He served as a naval intelligence officer in both World War II and the Korean war, and with the State Department between those wars. And Dick began his work for INR in 1952. Overall, he gave his country over half a century of service.

Mr. Curl's obituary states that his work `involved contact with various foreign intelligence services as well as U.S. intelligence agencies.' Suffice it to say that his role was often that of a mediator between the two different cultures, explaining the uses of intelligence to policymakers and Foreign Service officers while also ensuring that the risks and benefits of intelligence operations were weighed in light of broader U.S. policy interests that might be affected if something went wrong. Much of Dick Curl's career was spent teaching the policy and intelligence communities to listen to each other.

The staff of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence knew Mr. Curl since at least the early 1980's. They found him a valuable source of information and good counsel. Dick Curl will be missed by both the committee and his country.